I would also add another "If" to the argument. IF you're not hosting the stream yourself, and IF your source material is stereo, then sure, stream in stereo. The reason I stream in mono is that 1) a lot of my source material is mono and 2) I host the stream on my own computer, I want to maximize the number of users that can listen, and mono allows me to use a decent sounding bit-rate (I'd have to double it to get the same quality in stereo, which would halve the potential number of listeners).
Bringing back memories from the 1980s, I recall reading that a serious killer in the AM stereo push was the lack of a single standard. There were *how many?* different stereo methods, it was confusing, and the receivers and audience had an impossible task trying to deal with it.
Quad, since it's in the family of discarded formats, has sort of been replaced by 5.1 surround-sound, and I thought I heard talk a few years ago about radio and television with 5.1 sound, am I imagining that? "5.1 Surround" is kind of "Quad Plus."
Here are my final opinions and then I'm blocking access to my website and requiring a secure password (just making fun of you know what)...
1.) AM stereo should be "re-discovered" with only one standard method;
2.) Radio stations large and small should be offered the OPTION of installing stereo gear;
3.) Listeners should be given a CHOICE of whether to spend a little extra for stereo AM;
4.) Let's stop disposing of our better inventions.
5.) Join the ALPB.
The concept of AM stereo as we know it now will be moot anyway. I predict digital AM within the next 10-15 years as the new standard, just as TV was switched to digital. It will be impractical for people to buy converters for old analog AM radio sets to receive the new digital signals and we'll all be stuck with crappy, plastic digital AM radio sets. Unless of course a Part 15 digital receiving converter is made that will receive the new digital radio signals and rebroadcast them within the household as analog, under Part 15 rules for reception on the families vintage analog AM radio sets. Hmm.. I might want to get started on designing that now.... The Part 15'ers will be the last AM analog broadcasters.
Fortunatly by the time digital AM is forced upon us I will have retired from the industry, except for runing my then obsolete Part 15 station!
Tim in Bovey
Based on Tim's advice to stream in stereo, I am up late tonight testing stereo streaming.
While in mono the stream was 56 kb/s stream-rate, 44.1 kHz sample rate.
By switching to stereo the numbers change to 56 kb/s, 22.1 kHz.
To get the sample rate back up to 44.1 kHz it is necessary to stream at 96 kb/s, which is the setting I'm using for tonight's test.
There are ten different stereo settings possible between my original mono setting and the 96 kb/s test setting.
Aware that many people in the world have old computers and slow internet connections, I believe it will be of service to them to provide a second stream at lower bit-rates.
Which brings up yet another question about copyright regs... if the exact same audio is sent on two streams to serve people with different internet speeds, do copyright fees double?
That's a good question.
My first reaction was No, but then I thought, the exact same audio is broadcast as well as streamed, and you need separate licensing for each of those.
I don't think logic plays into the answer, so I'll leave it for someone else.
I had the chance to hear AM stereo when it came out, I had an AM Stereo portable radio by Sony and had a couple of car radios that received AM stereo. All I can say is the public droped the ball on the AM stereo format. So unfortunate that people on the street just took the "so what" attitude towards AM stereo and most of those people im sure still don't know what stereo really is in the first place. I hated to see AM stereo fall by the wayside. HD radio is going to do the same thing,how many people use HD radio and where are the receivers on todays market? if you want digital AM or FM then go HD or satalite radio. I dont know if radio (current AM and FM bands) will go all digital some day, why fix someting that isnt broke. TV used up a lot of bandwith so digital gave us more spectrum for other applications. Stardard AM and FM use just a speck of space. (if anyone can tell me what the old TV frequencies are used for I would like to know) I think the falling by the wayside of AM stereo was a big mistake, I wish it would make a comeback but most broadcasters that I know say the same thing, they changed things back to AM mono because of lack of manufactures making radios to receive the signal and the average listener dint even notice the difference. If you are into AM stereo, there are tons of car radios out there from the 80s that receive AM stereo you can convert them for home use. I still have one AM stereo receiver here by Radio Shack.. but some time ago I got interested in seeing what was on AM stereo and checked the listings... even the big markets around my part of the country simply stoped broadcasting AM stereo even when after they put thousands into new boards and transmitters. A real shame.
The science of sound-mixing for multi-channel sound is complex enough to require its own college. Why?
Because at the end of the line what starts out as 5.1 surround-sound might be mixed down to 2-channel stereo, which needs to be compatible in mono for radio listeners.
How many audio engineers understand all the complications of mixing and fading?
Me and two other guys unless you know somebody.
Listening to the results of mixdowns that get released often reveal the deep ignorance of people who earn a living by pretending to be sound mixers.
Voices that are unclear, indistinct, out-of-phase, buried in loud music and sound effects are commonly found, although I also notice that an amazing number of actors and announcers mumble and slur their speech, making it undecipherable, not the fault of the sound mixer.
The weak link in many cases isn't the sound guy or the actor, but the producer/directors who let sub-standard results get by.
Even more blame needs to go to public viewers and listeners who crunch away on popcorn and slurp soda, having no idea what the dialogue is all about. If they're not sitting on couch cushions watching the wall they are pushing a cart full of boxed appliances at WallMart.
Climate change is massing at the border ready to retaliate against bad mixing.
My stream was running "Monaural," and is now set for "Stereo."
I notice that many of the programs I get from many producers are recorded in mono, and they cause the stream to switch to "Mono," and when a program is recorded in stereo the stream switches to "Stereo."
I also notice something which I do not yet understand, the stream encoder can be set to stream in "Mono", "Stereo" or "Dual Mono."
If you know what "Dual-Mono" is let me know. I will be testing it to see if I can figure it out.
Yes, the reversion to monophonic by the majority of AM stereo broadcasters was nearsighted since listeners could still hear their AM stereo broadcasts in monophonic if necessary. To some degree, I can understand the limited availability of maintenance on aging AM stereo exciters as a motive for such reversion to AM monophonic. Thankfully, in the USA, we still have the C-QuAM standard. I talked to the manager of KRVN recently and he indicated that he planned on moving KRVN to AM stereo IF the owner approves the $170,000 for capital improvements (new Nautel 50 kW MW transmitter). Like many folks, he doesn't like Hybrid Digital either and he does recognize the potential of AM stereo even with KRVN's talk format since KRVN does broadcast music on weekends.
Is it easier to achieve a lock on an AM stereo broadcast via skywave or a lock on an HD broadcast via skywave? There are examples of listeners achieving excellent locks on AM stereo broadcasts via skywave from nearly 500 miles away from the transmitter.
If I am an example of the majority of folks on the street in the 1980s, I largely abandoned broadcasting for networking, e.g. CompuServe, as my source of information. Although AM stereo broadcasts and receivers were available in the 1980s, many of the former listeners were not by the dawn of the 1990s. Former listeners were more concerned with Windows 3.x and the newly commercialzed Internet than AM stereo.
AM stereo might be struggling amid other choices, but it isn't dead. Keep the faith.
Very Good presentation by tpreitzel about the upside of AM stereo.
And what I say now ties into some of what I said earlier, knowledge of microphone technique for stereo/mono phase compatibility can result not only in excellent music broadcasts, but also very pleasing voice interactions with spacial depth.
But the trick is avoiding phase distortion with multiple microphones in a small space. There is an art to it.
Of course, like anything, an analysis finds there is also a science to it.
Let's put it this way...
If the science is properly applied the art is realized.
I could talk about this for hours,
probably. I have the wonderful
Sony SRF A-100, but it is slightly
intermittent and looks like it fell off
of a cliff. (The SRF A-100 was/is an
AM stereo radio that decoded all 4
standards from way back then.)
There are 2 AM daytimers at the
fringe of my monitoring area that
do C-QUAM. I can hear one of them
well enough to enjoy it. (Signal strength
doesn't matter.) I think the engineers that
run these stations like C-QUAM also, so
they just keep it going as best as they can.
I believe you can order a Sony SRF-300
C-QUAM (other standards, I don't know) directly
from Japan. If I had the money I would get one.
(The SRF-A300 looks very much like the old SRF-A100.)
If my AM Part 15 was running and I could do
C-QUAM, I would. But it would just be for
my personal enjoyment.
Nruce, Mon. Stn., CT
Now, if the FCC hadn't UNWISELY mandated the C-QuAM standard, medium wave broadcasters of all stripes would currently have much more flexibility in merging technologies like Independent Sideband (ISB) and radiograms. I'm NOT dissing the C-QuAM standard as it's excellent, but the decision by the FCC to not mandate an AM stereo standard was the correct one. Overall, Kahn's approach to AM stereo was probably the most flexible into the future.
We need INNOVATION on the MW band which the FCC stifles through nearsighted and reckless actions. Just witness Hybrid Digital, another mandated standard.